Sentence(s) of the Day

So what is the “key difference” between the parties? Rhetoric. When Republicans advocate a small contraction of the welfare state, Democrats claim that Republicans totally oppose the welfare state. And many Republicans oblige them by standing up for “liberty” and “responsibility.” Similarly, when Democrats advocate a small expansion in the welfare state, Republican claim that Democrats oppose free markets. And many Democrats oblige them by saying things like “markets only benefit the rich.”

This rhetorical illusion is so powerful that when a Democrat like Clinton adopts many pro-market reforms, Republicans still hate him as a 60s radical. And when Bush II sharply expands the welfare state, Democrats still hate him as a billionaire’s lackey.

Bryan Caplan

I have wondered about this myself. If Clinton was the best Republican president since the war (as Greenspan said), then Bush personified many of the things that Republicans say they fear from a Democratic administration: he expanded the entitlements of the welfare state (the biggest expansion for decades), he bust the budget (which Clinton had sent into surplus), he increased the national debt, and he expanded the bureaucracy of the Department of Education to meddle into the affairs of local school. He did all of this with encouragement from a Republican Congress. The same Republican Congress passed the highly anti-business and meddlesome Sarbanes-Oxley Act. Yet, Republicans can still claim with a straight face to stand for smaller government and not be laughed out of the room.

Frankly, I don’t fully understand it.

So what is the "key difference" between the parties? Rhetoric. When Republicans advocate a small contraction of the welfare state, Democrats claim that Republicans totally oppose the welfare state. And many Republicans oblige them by standing up for "liberty" and "responsibility." Similarly, when Democrats advocate a small expansion in the welfare state, Republican claim ...